


(Never, Ever) Disrespect

by rosewiththorns



Category: Hockey RPF
Genre: Detroit Red Wings, Discipline, Disrespect, Frusturation, Gen, Hurt/Comfort, Kneeling, Kneeling Universe, M/M, Mouth Washed out with Soap, Non-Sexual Submission, Spanking, cursing, mentoring
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-02-18
Updated: 2016-02-18
Packaged: 2018-05-21 10:39:36
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,256
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6048427
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/rosewiththorns/pseuds/rosewiththorns
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>After a rough game against the Islanders, Alexey makes the mistake of taking out his frustration on the wrong person. Written per reader request.</p>
            </blockquote>





	(Never, Ever) Disrespect

**Author's Note:**

  * For [loveforhockey](https://archiveofourown.org/users/loveforhockey/gifts).



> Since the dialogue takes place between two Russians, I decided to eliminate the accents and just allow readers to imagine that they are conversing in Russian. As they are speaking in Russian, I used Russian diminutives--Pasha for Pavel and Lyosha for Alexey.

“I was taught you never, ever disrespect your opponent or your teammates or your organization or your manager, and never, ever your uniform.”—Ryne Sandberg

(Never, Ever) Disrespect

After the fiasco against the Islanders (it had been Alexey’s worst performance all season by a margin wide enough to fly a Boeing 747 through, so he wasn’t going to dignify it by calling it a game in the tortured maelstrom of his thoughts), all Alexey wanted to do was bury his face in the too-clean smelling pillows in his hotel room. Sleep was probably going to be out of the question—because when he shut his eyes, every single mistake would probably flit through his head like a horror movie he couldn’t switch off with a remote—but at least he could hide his tears when they inevitably fell. 

Unfortunately, his desire would have to remain unfulfilled for awhile yet, as Pavel had steered him into his room—veterans were lucky ducks, who got double rooms they didn’t have to share, unlike lowly rookies, Alexey observed inwardly with a mixture of jealousy and petulance—and had tossed one of the hotel pillows stacked along the headboard of his bed onto the Turkish carpet before sitting down with a rustle of comforter, ordering, “Kneel, Lyosha.” 

Every exhausted and aching muscle throbbing in Alexey’s body revolted at Pavel’s casual certainty that he would comply with the command just because he was a stinking rookie without about as much status as a clod of dirt. It was on the tip of his tongue to snap back that he didn’t feel like kneeling when Pavel, who apparently deemed that Alexey had been still for too long, gave him a nudging tap on the knee, repeating crisply, “Kneel, I said.” 

“I heard you the first time,” grunted Alexey, jerking his knee away in case Pavel decided to upgrade the force of his taps from nudging to genuinely persuasive or absolutely compelling. 

“Then do as you’re told.” Pavel arched an eyebrow and pointed a finger at the pillow on the carpet. 

“Why, Pasha?” Mulishly, Alexey lifted his chin. 

“Because I’m your mentor, and you’re my rookie, Lyosha.” Pavel folded his arms across his chest as if he had just made an unassailable argument rather than appealed to a tradition that Alexey currently didn’t give a fig about. 

“Maybe I don’t want you to be my mentor or to be your rookie any more,” exploded Alexey, stamping his foot and only experiencing an increase in his ire as the carpet muffled most of the noise. “Perhaps I’m tired of having to do whatever the fuck I’m told just because I’m a rookie who gets crapped on all the time.” 

“I don’t care if you’re tired, you’ll do as you’re told.” Pavel, before Alexey could process what was happening, delivered a sharp swat to Alexey’s sweatpants-clad backside. As Alexey gasped in mingled shock and pain, Pavel continued, face as inscrutable as stone and almost as hard, “Kneel or I’ll take you over my knee.” 

Understanding that spanking threat and not wishing for it to become reality with his ass in the line of fire, Alexey, jaw trembling—from a fury that blurred his eyes and spurred his stomach into turning backflips—sank to his knees on the pillow. His cheeks were flaming, not from shame as they had the last time Pavel had smacked his bottom when he had pitched a temper tantrum over being benched, but from rage that he had been hit and was being made to kneel at all. 

“I’m kneeling.” Alexey glared up at Pavel to make it clear that, while he was kneeling, he had by no means lowered his weapons or surrendered. “Happy now, Pasha?” 

“No.” Pavel’s lips thinned. “I’m not happy with your behavior.” 

“You’re a real bastard.” The words burst out of Alexey before he could stop them. 

“Watch your dirty mouth, Lyosha.” Pavel gave Alexey’s cheek an admonishing pat. “Curse at me again tonight, and I’ll decide that it can only be cleaned out with soap.” 

“Go fuck yourself with a hockey stick,” hissed Alexey, whose mouth seemed to be set on an autopilot crash-and-burn course. 

Pushing Alexey further into the pillow with a stern palm on his shoulder, Pavel swept into the bathroom, warning tersely, “Stay there or a washed-out mouth will be the least of your problems.” 

Gnawing on his lip and tasting the metallic tang of blood on his tongue as the tender skin split under the pressure of his teeth, Alexey, who could hear Pavel rummaging in the bathroom, winced, because, while it had been about a decade since he had last gotten his mouth washed out with soap, he could still remember almost choking on the suds. 

Alexey was at the point of calculating whether he could make a desperate bid for escape—if he really hustled, maybe he would have time to bolt out of Pavel’s room and down the hall to his own, where he could lock the door to prevent himself from any soap that Pavel might wield against him—but any chance of fleeing vanished when Pavel emerged from the bathroom, carrying a bar of complimentary hotel soap in a balled fist. 

Resuming his position on the bed, Pavel rapped out, “Open your mouth, Lyosha.” 

Jaw clenching in a protest that might have been instinctual or deliberate for all he knew, Alexey shook his head. 

“Open.” Firmly enough to emphasize his seriousness but not forcefully enough to hurt, Pavel tapped Alexey’s taut jaw. 

Tears already beginning to well in his eyes, Alexey dropped his jaw enough for Pavel’s deft hands to slip the bar of soap inside. As the bar of soap went about its scourging work, delving deep into the canyons of his cheeks and traversing the length of his tongue several times to leave a slimy trail like a dying snail’s, apparently determined to purge any foul language that might be lurking in Alexey’s mouth, the tears that had formed in Alexey’s eyes started to trickle down his face. They were flowing down his cheeks in a salty stream that mixed most unappetizingly with the chemicals in the soap before Pavel finally removed the bar of soap from Alexey’s tortured mouth. 

“That unpleasant business is done, Lyosha.” Pavel squeezed Alexey’s shoulder with the hand that wasn’t chucking the used soap into the trash can beside his bed. “Just swallow, and it will all be over.” 

“You son of a bitch.” Unable to bear the taste of any more soap and humiliated by the childish punishment for profanity that he had been subjected to, Alexey, instead of swallowing, spat the wad of soap toward Pavel’s face, but Pavel, who had quick wits and lightning reflexes, ducked just in time. 

A second after he realized that he had literally just spat into the face of one of the most respected figures in Russian hockey history, Alexey was appalled with himself and was about to stammer out an apology for his abominable action when Pavel, studying him with a sadness that multiplied Alexey’s remorse tenfold, pronounced in a tone that was uncompromising but not unsympathetic, “Lyosha, I’ve tried warning you and washing your mouth out, but that hasn’t worked, so I’m going to have to resort to a simpler solution.” 

Then Alexey felt a yank on his elbows before he was hauled unceremoniously over Pavel knees. Before he could start squirming—because the last thing he wanted to cap off an awful evening was a spanking—Pavel pressed a palm against his shoulder blade, while the other hand snaked around Alexey’s waist to tug his sweatpants down to his kneecaps, which found their kicking impeded by the circle of clothing that was relocated around them. Aware of what a pathetic picture he must present, draped over Pavel’s lap like a bulky blanket and awaiting a spanking for being a brat, was dimly grateful that at least Pavel had made no movement to remove his boxers, sparing him the indignity of a bare-bottomed spanking. 

Less than a second later, there was no time to be appreciative of anything when Pavel brought his palm smashing down on Alexey’s rear with enough inertia to shoot the air out of Alexey’s lungs, scolding, as he continued to rain swats on Alexey’s behind, “You don’t curse at me. You don’t spit in my face. You do as I tell you. You respect me. That last one is the most important. Understand, Lyosha?” 

“Yes.” Alexey wasn’t sure whether the cries ripping through him were from guilt, the white-hot agony burning in his buttocks, or both. “Sorry.” 

“I don’t expect to have this conversation with you again.” Pavel underscored each word with a scorching smack. “If I do, it’ll be held with your bare behind.” 

“You won’t have to, Pasha.” Alexey managed to gasp out through the cries that had mounted into sobs. “I promise.” 

“Good.” After a final, searing spank, Pavel restored Alexey’s sweatpants to their original location, and then, crooning comforting noises, guided Alexey into an upright position on his lap and attempted to coax Alexey’s tear-stained face into looking at him, but Alexey, even more ashamed of how contemptuously he had behaved toward a hockey legend who had never treated him with anything but kindness and patience, twisted his head away, convinced that he was as unworthy to meet Pavel’s gaze as a dung-smeared pig was fit to keep a president company at a banquet. 

“Ah.” Pavel clucked his tongue, whether in reproach or amusement Alexey couldn’t be certain and didn’t dare glance at Pavel’s expression to uncover a clue to resolve this mystery. “I had to give you a spanking for being rude, and now you’re too embarrassed to look at me. I see.” 

“I’m not embarrassed because you spanked me,” Alexey muttered, mortified by his situation, but determined to ensure that Pavel really did see, since Alexey might have been a brat who deserved every swat of that spanking, but he had in his favor that he was a penitent one, not a sulky one. “I’m embarrassed because I was so bad that you had to spank me, Pasha.” 

“Oh, Lyosha.” Pavel sighed Alexey’s name as he drew Alexey against his chest in a hug. Stroking Alexey’s shaking back with a ginger palm, he murmured, “It’s all forgiven and forgotten now that you’ve been punished.” 

“I don’t understand why I acted like such a jerk, though.” Alexey swiped the tears away from his eyes, although he sensed that this was a futile endeavor, since undoubtedly more would fall down to take their place like shark teeth replacing those that were lost. “I know I had no right to behave that way toward you.” 

“I have a wild guess.” Pavel’s fingers combed through Alexey’s hair. “You felt so guilty for your rough game tonight that you craved strict discipline and were very stubborn about provoking me into providing it for you.” 

“If we’re discussing the rough game—“ Alexey fiddled with a frayed string of comforter—“should I kneel?” 

“No.” Pavel rested a stilling hand over Alexey’s before it could damage the comforter. “I wanted you to kneel so we could discuss the game and I could offer you the discipline you needed, but you’ve already been disciplined, and, as you’ve so astutely noted, we’re already discussing the game in this rather more comforting posture.” 

“Thank you.” Alexey hoped that Pavel understood that he was grateful for the discipline, the comfort, and the concession to remaining in this more relaxed position. “If you want to scold me about my horrible game, I’m ready to listen without arguing.” 

“I don’t want to scold.” Pavel swept the hair away from Alexey’s forehead and brushed his lips against the exposed skin in a swift kiss. “I just want to give you advice.” 

“Even better.” Alexey flashed a tremulous grin and stared up at Pavel with excitement in his eyes that were still watery from his spanking. “I’m definitely listening now.” 

“You look like you’re all ears.” Pavel pulled playfully at Alexey’s earlobes before remarking in a voice that made it plain he had made the transition back to serious, “I recognize that you were frustrated by how tonight went, but you can’t take your frustration out on anyone—whether it’s me, a teammate, a coach, or the media. That’s not fair, and it doesn’t solve your problem. In fact, it makes it worse, because you will inevitably feel guilty about venting your spleen on somebody who did you no wrong.” 

“What should I do instead, Pasha?” asked Alexey, cocking his head inquisitively.

“What you should always do.” Pavel ruffled Alexey’s hair. “Take deep breaths to calm down. Then focus on learning from your mistakes and working hard to do things right, because when you work hard to do things right, you will eventually get rewarded.” 

For a moment, Alexey was silent as he contemplated this—turning it over in his mind to examine it from all perspectives—and then he said softly, “I’ll try to do that. Really I will. And I’m so glad you’re my mentor because you’re the best one I could ever have.” 

“Half an hour ago, you weren’t saying that.” Pavel’s gentle chuckle vibrated against Alexey, who was still pressed against his chest in a hug.

“I was wrong.” Alexey grinned wryly at the memory of his mad—by all definitions—declaration that he didn’t want Pavel as his mentor any more. “I’m grateful that you knocked some sense into me.”


End file.
